Category: China

A former member of the South Korean rock band Boohwal has been identified as one of 69 people implicated in a Ponzi scheme that collected more than 200 billion won (US$136 million) from illegal investments and stole 19 billion won. Police said singer Kim Jae-hee, 54, who once performed as Boohwal’s fourth vocalist, took part in promotional activities that helped recruit victims. According to the Incheon Metropolitan Police Agency on Sunday, Kim was among those sent to prosecutors on charges… Source link

Japan’s plan to significantly increase the price of residency visas for foreigners to match the rates in the West has divided the expatriate community, which fears the move would further worsen the country’s persistent labour shortages. The additional revenue will be used to “improve conditions for the rapidly growing foreign resident population” and enhance efforts to deport illegal immigrants, the Yomiuri Shimbun reported on Thursday, citing government sources. A bill to amend the Immigration… Source link

A Japanese woman turned to ChatGPT for comfort after ending a real three-year engagement, then found herself in love and marrying her artificial intelligence (AI) generated partner. The virtual relationship was sealed when she wore augmented reality (AR) glasses to exchange rings with her digital husband at their “nuptials”. The woman, 32, who uses the pseudonym Kano, began chatting with ChatGPT after ending her three-year engagement to a real man, gradually turning to her AI “man” for comfort… Source link

Snapchat has begun asking teenage Australians to verify their ages, the company said on Monday, just weeks before Canberra enforces sweeping laws banning under 16s from social media. From December 10, Australia will force social media platforms, including Facebook, Instagram and TikTok, to remove users under the age of 16 or face hefty fines. “Starting this week, many users will be asked to verify their age to continue accessing Snapchat,” the company said. Users will be able to do so using an… Source link

Hong Kong plays a “pivotal role” in Sino-Egyptian relations, according to top officials from the North African nation, who have expressed high hopes of boosting trade and tourism with the city through cultural exchanges. Baher Sheweikhi, Egypt’s consul general for Hong Kong and Macau, said he was confident that a nine-month exhibition at the Hong Kong Palace Museum, which began on Thursday and features 250 historical artefacts, including mummies, statues, jewellery and more, could translate into… Source link

When activist Sudirman Arshad walked into a Kota Kinabalu police station last month, the 22-year-old expected to file a routine report after a minor traffic accident. Instead, he was held for hours and questioned under Malaysia’s Sedition Act over a rally he had helped organise. The experience left him shaken, but also confirmed a nagging suspicion: Sabah’s political establishment has finally realised that Gen Z is no longer content to sit quietly on the sidelines. His brush with the law came as… Source link

Bosnia’s Serb Republic former president Milorad Dodik said that his party’s candidate, Sinisa Karan, has won a snap presidential election on Sunday with a slim majority. The election was called after Dodik was stripped of his office and banned from politics for six years. “Our candidate Sinisa Karan won today’s election,” Dodik declared at the headquarters of his Alliance of Independent Social Democrats party (SNSD). The central election commission will announce preliminary election results on… Source link

Meanwhile, Taliban officials said earlier this year that the CASA-1000 project would be completed in the next one to two years. Source link

Every month seems to bring a new Indonesian arms deal, but there is no updated and publicly accessible strategic document to tie them all together. Source link

Nicholas Lardy is a non-resident senior fellow at the Peterson Institute for International Economics and a member of the Council on Foreign Relations, both Washington-based think tanks. He has studied the Chinese economy extensively, publishing several books on its growth and development since the late 1970s. His most recent, 2019’s The State Strikes Back, posits a rollback of Beijing’s economic reforms via renewed government intervention into the market. This interview first appeared in SCMP… Source link

Slovenians on Sunday voted to suspend a new law to legalise assisted dying in a referendum held after critics mounted a campaign against the legislation. Around 53 per cent of voters had rejected the law, while 47 per cent voted in favour, meaning its implementation will be suspended for at least one year. Slovenia’s parliament had approved a law in July allowing assisted dying after a 2024 referendum supported it. But the new vote was called after a civil group, backed by the Catholic Church… Source link

South Korea, under President Lee Jae-myung, has repeatedly proclaimed its desire to improve relations and re-engage in diplomacy with North Korea. Yet a landmark agreement with Washington formalised last week reveals a starkly different priority: advancing military capabilities that will almost certainly drive the two Koreas further apart. The United States has officially approved South Korea’s pursuit of nuclear-powered submarines while supporting Seoul’s efforts to secure uranium enrichment… Source link

International airlines increasingly cancelled flights to Venezuela on Sunday after the US Federal Aviation Administration warned pilots to use caution when flying in the country’s airspace because of worsening security and heightened military activity. Marisela de Loaiza, president of the Airlines Association in Venezuela, said six carriers have indefinitely suspended flights: TAP, LATAM, Avianca, Iberia, Gol and Caribbean. Turkish Airlines suspended flights from November 24 to 28. She did not… Source link

The global sporting body alleges that seven foreign-born players used false documents to gain entry to the Malaysian national soccer team. Source link

South African police are investigating claims that a daughter of ex-president Jacob Zuma was involved in recruiting men to join Russian mercenaries in the Ukraine war, police said on Sunday. The allegations against Duduzile Zuma-Sambudla, an MP in her father’s MK political party, were made by one of her sisters in an affidavit asking for a formal investigation, police said. It claims Zuma-Sambudla and two other people were involved in recruiting 17 South Africans whom the presidency said this… Source link

Pressure is increasing for Andrew, the former British prince, to give evidence to a US congressional committee investigating the convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein after Britain’s prime minister suggested he should testify. Keir Starmer declined to comment directly about King Charles’ disgraced younger brother but told reporters travelling with him for the Group of 20 (G20) summit in Johannesburg that as a “general principle” people should provide evidence to investigators. “I don’t comment… Source link

While located in the remote southwestern part of China, Guizhou leads the development of Big Data technology in recent years. Source link

The 16-story structure was said to be the tallest wooden pagoda in Asia. No casualties were reported in the incident. The cause of the blaze is under investigation. Source link

An old man in Shanghai who became an online celebrity by “waiting for love” every evening at a landmark has turned out to be a deadbeat who refused to fulfil a court order that he pay a large amount of outstanding rent to his landlord. The true identity of the man, known as Xu, was revealed by Shanghai TV in mid-November. This attracted much attention on social media thanks to his previous “romantic” persona. He went viral online last year when many people saw him dressed neatly, carrying a… Source link

Ukrainian, US and European officials met in Geneva, Switzerland on Sunday to discuss a draft plan presented by Washington to end the war in Ukraine, after Kyiv and its allies voiced alarm over what they saw as major concessions to the aggressor Russia. US President Donald Trump, who has championed the 28-point plan, said on Sunday that Ukraine had not been grateful for American efforts over the war, even as US weapons continue to flow to Kyiv via Nato and Europe keeps buying Russian… Source link

Each winter for the past three years, Claire Zhou, a teenager from the southern Chinese city of Guangzhou, has counted down the days until she can fly to northern China and pull on a new ski suit and boots. The better she skis, the more frequently she upgrades her gear, reshaping her family’s holiday budget and pulling them deeper into China’s fast-growing winter sports consumption chain. The country’s winter sports boom, sparked by the 2022 Beijing Winter Olympics and fuelled by supportive… Source link

The crash of India’s Tejas fighter in front of global arms buyers at the Dubai Air Show is the latest blow to a key national trophy, leaving the jet reliant on Indian military orders to sustain its role as a showcase of home-built defence technology. The cause of Friday’s crash was not immediately known but it capped a week of jockeying for influence at the event, attended by India’s arch-rival Pakistan six months after the neighbouring foes faced off in the world’s largest air battle in… Source link

The narrative of “AI at all costs” seems to have lost some steam recently. Once heralded as an unstoppable force for growth, artificial intelligence now faces critical questions about sustainability, particularly as funding models and market sentiment shift. One indicator worth watching closely in comparison with the dotcom era is the source of funding for hyperscaler capital expenditure. We are now seeing evidence that companies have started to rely on debt rather than free cash flows and… Source link

Two bodies were recovered from Hong Kong waters in two separate incidents on Sunday, with police working to uncover their identities. Police received a report at 2.20pm that a woman was seen drifting in the waters about 2km (1.2 miles) off isolated Shek Kwu Chau, an island located 3km west of Cheung Chau. She was confirmed dead at the scene. No identification documents or suicide note were recovered. Separately, the force received a report at 3.40pm about a man floating in waters about 20… Source link